Steadfast and Immovable

Our beautiful Northern Pin Oak

This post is part of the General Conference Odyssey. This week covers the Young Womens session of the April 2003 conference.

The theme for this meeting was taken from the Mutual theme for the year, 2 Nephi 31:20, Ye must press forward with a steadfastness in Christ, having a perfect brightness of hope, and a love of God and of all men.

I'll share some of my favorite quotes from each talk.

Susan W. Tanner:  

Speaking of Abraham, "He did not know the outcome of that test as we know it from a historical perspective. He was walking into the unknown. Still he was steadfast. He was living on promises that the Lord would bless him. Whatever nervousness he may have felt didn't deter him from pressing forward with a steadfastness in Christ."

Isn't that how every life is? We can't see the outcome, only where we are now, hoping that the outcome will be what we want. That is why life takes trusting the Lord and following Him because of His omniscience. 

"But when you keep your covenants, you will learn to more fully love those to whom you are eternally bound. Then you will also be able to extend your love beyond that circle to others."

I want to explore the connection between keeping covenants and love. I'm not very good at loving others. I tolerate others, but don't feel unconditional love for most people. I know I have to do better in this area because while I think I'm keeping my covenants, I must not be in the right way, because I'm not experiencing this particular fruit.

Julie B. Beck: "My mother has stayed in the Savior's path with unshaken faith in Him (see 2 Nephi 31:19) all the days of her life. She wakes up every day looking forward to new adventures. For her, life is so interesting, and she still has so much to learn."

I know a little bit about Sister Beck's mother and the challenges she faced in life. Oh how I want to be more like her in her attitude! I often wonder what it would be like to be equally yoked in marriage and if that would make a difference in my spiritual and emotional strength. Too often I feel so beaten down and exhausted by the consequences of who I chose to marry and the draining struggles of our differences. 

Elaine B. Dalton: "Nephi not only had a vision of how to return to his heavenly home, but he also had a vision of what he wanted in his earthly home. The Savior will help you see and understand the vision He has for you."

My mission president told us that God's will for us could be achieved only with our full cooperation. Which I believe with all my soul. But after I'd been married for a decade I realized that now I was in a "love triangle" and it would take the cooperation of another to realize God's vision. That old unequally yoked business. But I keep working on myself so that I know I've done all I can.

President James E. Faust: "I can say without hesitation that you can have a 'perfect brightness of hope' for your future and endless joy if you 'press forward' as righteous daughters of God."

I hope he means it is never too late!

"A person who is humble is teachable."

That's what I strive to be.

"The character thus formed from self-discipline will rise with you in the Resurrection."

Good to know! It helps me keep going.

"Remember that you and the Church will be judged in part by your cleanliness and neatness in appearance."

In the Doctrine and Covenants section 42:40 is the phrase '. . . let all thy garments be plain, and their beauty the beauty of the work of thine own hands.' I believe that "plain" doesn't mean unadorned or dowdy, rather it means clear, unmistakable, obvious, as in it is plain that we are covenant people, followers of Jesus Christ. And when the fashions of the world are not compatible with our covenants, then we make our own clothing and set our own style and fashion. If we say to the world that we are virtuous followers of Jesus, but dress like the world, doesn't that make for confusion? We are called to be different from the world to attract those who are seeking purity, virtue, and relief from the evils of the world.

"Grace is a God-given virtue. It is a disposition to be kind and to do good. . . . Charm is attractiveness which comes from a feeling of personal dignity, an inner beauty that comes from a feeling of self-worth."

Too many times in my life I lack both grace and charm. Sad to admit. But I'm working on it.

"It may be that your most significant, everlasting achievements will be your righteous influence on others, that your divine feminine inner beauty and intuition will find expression in your quiet strength, gentleness, dignity, charm, graciousness, creativity, sensitivity, radiance, and spirituality. Enhance these sublime feminine gifts. They will make you appealing and even irresistible as you serve others as the handmaidens of God."

Still at age 66 (December 30), that's my goal. At my funeral I want to be remembered as a women like President Faust describes. I'd better to get work!

Follow the Instructions

This post is part of the General Conference Odyssey. This week covers the Sunday morning session of the April 2003 conference.

"Every person experiences many challenges in this mortal life. Each has personal agency to make choices that affect his or her progress. Good choices bring promised blessings, and bad choices always bring undesired consequences."

Wisdom from Elder D. Rex Gerratt of the Seventy.

"As in times past, we receive instructions from the Lord's living prophet. . . . After receiving instructions, we need to be obedient and hearken to the counsel we receive. We need to listen to and follow our appointed leaders."

This was a short talk with a powerful message. 

Holy Place, Sacred Space

This post is part of the General Conference Odyssey. This week covers the Sunday morning session of the April 2003 conference.

For years I've been saying that I want to write a book about teaching children reverence. In 2012 I wrote a blog post on that subject. I feel like the need for parental instruction has only gotten more acute as the years go by, and fewer parents understand how to teach their children to be and feel reverent. Well, I'll get to writing that book someday soon. In the meantime, I enjoyed the counsel from Elder Dennis B. Neuenschwander. "Our ability to seek, recognize, and reverence the holy above the profane, and the sacred above the secular, defines our spirituality."

Learning reverence for things holy and sacred begins in the home during the spiritual times such as prayer, Family Home Evening, visits from ministering brethren (I miss the Home Teaching visits), visits from missionaries, watching General Conference, and such. Whatever behavior is tolerated at home during these times will be displayed at church during similar activities.

Elder Neuenschwander reminds us:

Holy places have always been essential to the proper worship of God. For Latter-day Saints, such holy places include venues of historic significance, our homes, sacrament meetings, and temples. Much of what we reverence, and what we teach our children to reverence as holy and sacred, is reflected in these places. The faith and reverence associated with them and the respect we have for what transpires or has transpired in them make them holy. The importance of holy places and sacred space in our worship can hardly be overestimated.

When I talk to parents of young children I remind them that reverence is best learned at home with lots and lots of practice so that the behaviors become automatic when in serious, sacred and holy places and times. (Weddings, funerals, flag ceremonies, sacrament meetings, concerts, ballet performances, or other serious events.) Feeling the Spirit takes practice, and lots of it. Children learn by having sacred experiences at home, first learning the behaviors that invite the spirit and then the good feelings that come from receiving the spirit.

The words sacred and sacrifice come from the same root. One may not have the sacred without first sacrificing something for it. There can be no sacredness without personal sacrifice. Sacrifice sanctifies the sacred. . . . The establishment of our homes as holy places reflects the depths of sacrifice we are willing to make for them.

This talk was given a year and a half after the 9/11 attacks, during the war on terror when the world was in turmoil and people were fearful. There were many talks (always, it seems) that mentioned the perilous times. Elder Neuenschwander ended with this wonderful invitation:

In holy places and in sacred spaces we find spiritual refuge, renewal, hope, and peace. Are these not worth every necessary personal sacrifice? My brethren and sisters, may each of us revere and respect the holy and sacred in our lives. May we teach our children likewise. Let us all stand in holy and sacred places of spiritual peace. 

 

 

 

 

 

Poignant Pain

This post is part of the General Conference Odyssey. This week covers the Priesthood session of the April 2003 conference.

I have come to a greater understanding of why some women hate church on Mother's Day. It is painful to be at church on a day when the very thing you want and have been denied is celebrated. Of course, Mother's Day is on the calendar and well known ahead of time so a person can choose to make other plans for that day. I often get blindsided by Sacrament meeting talks by departing missionaries, returning missionaries, serving missionaries or parents reporting on their missionaries. It reminds me of my failures and missed blessings, all rather painful.

This particular Priesthood session was much the same, all about missionaries. When the talks were given my four boys were still young and I was still full of hope and faith that they would all serve and I would be surrounded by priesthood power. This time around was much more painful and poignant.

Elder Daryl H. Garn spoke of the example of a particular returned missionary. "Because of his example I began looking at my associates at school, including those on the basketball team, and realized that the people I most wanted to be like were those who had served missions." I have found that the youth in the rural Midwest miss out on those examples and associations because all the returned missionaries arrive, report their missions, and quickly leave again to go to school in the Utah/Idaho area. There were no examples, mentors or friends to guide or encourage our sons. I'm not sure what the answer is, but hopefully the FSY conferences will help. (We were too poor to send our children to EFY.)

Bishop H. David Burton said, "Our bishops serve as personal trainers and use their sacred priesthood keys to bless our lives." I thought, well, only if they don't work four hours away in another state and are home only on weekends. When our son needed a strong priesthood leader to guide him through the repentance process, all he got were a few texts each week, never face to face time exploring the scriptures or conference talks together, no time serving, working or playing together. Our son missed out on help at a critical time and never truly recovered. (And what seemed especially strange to us was that the branch president never spoke to us about what we could do to help our son, even when we asked.)

President James E. Faust spoke of staying out of The Devil's Throat. 

My dear young friends, there is another great truth that you young men must learn. It is that everything has a price. There is a price to pay for success, fulfillment, accomplishment, and joy. There are no freebies. If you don't pay the price that is needed for success, you will pay the price of failure.

I can't completely blame others for the failures in our family. We all have agency and made choices without seeing the long-term effects and consequences. These are painful lessons to learn. I wonder what I would say to the me of 2003 if I could go back in time. Or the me of 1980 when I was a freshly returned missionary. 

I take hope from President Thomas S. Monson's talk in which he said, ". . . I share the observation that the seeds of testimony frequently do not immediately take root and flower. Bread cast upon the water returns, at times, only after many days. But it does return." I have hope that someday my wandering sons will return to the teachings planted in their hearts in their childhood and youth by a loving mother.

Words to Live By

This post is part of the General Conference Odyssey. This week covers the Saturday afternoon session of the April 2003 conference.

Every talk in this session was, of course, wonderful. But I want to focus on two topics.

From Elder James M. Dunn of the Seventy,

We live in a world marked by great diversity: different lands, cultures, races, and languages. To some degree, at least, one must believe that this is the way God intended it to be. The gospel teaches us that, notwithstanding these differences, we are all children of the same Heavenly Father. The human race is one family, and we are all, therefore, brothers and sisters.

To remember that we all are brothers and sisters is thinking celestially. How we treat each other will be a reflection of our thinking. He explains,

As the result of . . . erroneous thinking, the world is filled with lurid and lascivious attractions. We see young men refusing to marry; young women foolishly surrendering their virtue in pursuit of lustful relationships; couples who purposefully refuse to have children or who opt for a "trophy child" because a family would interfere with plans for adventure, leisure, or maximum financial gain.

 

Elder Dunn explained that, "Successfully working our way through life, while keeping our eye on life's true purposes, blesses us both here and hereafter." 

Later in the session, Elder L. Tom Perry said, quoting Brigham Young, ". . . our families are not yet ours. The Lord has committed them to us to see how we will treat them. Only if we are faithful will they be given to us forever. What we do on earth determines whether or not we will be worthy to become heavenly parents."

Isn't it sad that so many don't quite understand the consequences of their choices, which are eternal in nature. This week I was thinking about how everything is spiritual to God; every commandment, etc., and the thought came to me that, of course, everything is spiritual to Him because He lives in a spiritual realm where time is not measured, and He can see the end from the beginning and understands all things. We live in a finite, mortal world, where sometimes we can't see past the end of our nose. We have to learn to trust Him, His sight and wisdom, and simply obey, even when we don't understand why. That is what becoming like a child means. (See Matthew 18:1-3, and Mosiah 3:19) I hope that I'm doing better the older I get.

Recently I've been thinking about missionary work. I would love to serve another mission. (I served in Florida Tallahassee Mission, 1979-1980, under LeGrand R. Curtis) I have been pondering how I can help build our small branch here in Minnesota as well. Elder Henry B. Eyring and Elder M. Russell Ballard gave great talks on missionary work, especially as done by ordinary members. 

Elder Eyring posed the question we might ask, "How could I become better at sharing my faith with those who do not yet feel what I feel?" He said, "There is no single pattern in what they do. [From the stories of people who have shared the gospel.] There is no common technique. . . . Each has prayed to know what to do. They each seem to get a different answer, suited especially to them and to the people they meet." 

One of the challenges I face is that I'm simply at home most of the time. I don't go outside to work; I'm not part of any school parent's group; I haven't taken any classes, or joined a group of any kind. I go to church, I go out for errands, (bank, post office, shopping, etc.) and that's it. Plus the fact that we live 45 minutes from the church is another detriment. (Not to mention that our branch seldom has any social activities to invite anyone to.) So opportunities for missionary moments are rare. But Elder Eyring advises,

Pray for the chance to encounter people who sense there could be something better in their lives. Pray to know what you should do to help them. Your prayers will be answered. You will meet people prepared by the Lord. You will find yourself feeling and saying things beyond your past experience. And then in time you will feel yourself drawing closer to your Heavenly Father, and you will feel the cleansing and the forgiveness the Savior promises His faithful witnesses. And you will feel His approval, knowing you have done what He asked of you, because He love you and trusts you.

 

Elder M. Russell Ballard, after speaking of raising the bar for full-time missionaries, said, ". . . we must also raise the level of expectation for the performance of all the members of the church in fulfilling our missionary duties." 

 

Remember, brothers and sisters, we're not marketing a product. We're not selling anything. We're not trying to impress anyone with our numbers or our growth. We are members of the restored Church of Jesus Christ, empowered and sent forth by the Lord Himself to find, nourish, and bring safely into His Church those who are seeking to know the truth.

Elder Ballard quotes President Hinckley from 1999, "I would like to suggest that every bishop in the Church give as a motto to his people, 'Let's all work to grow the ward.'" It boggles my mind when I hear people in our branch say they don't want it to grow, they enjoy the smallness and intimacy of the branch. I'm rather tired of that smallness, and the sameness, and the lack of training and vision, and the lack of sociality. Distances are great, and most everyone is too busy with worldly pursuits to want to add any church activities to the mix. So different from when I grew up, when the church was the social center of our lives. (I miss the olden days!)     

Again from Elder Ballard, 

Happiness comes from understanding God and knowing that He has a plan for our eternal joy and peace. Happiness comes from knowing and loving the Savior and living our lives in accordance with His teachings. Happiness comes from strong family and Church relationships based on gospel values.

How can we not want to help others enjoy what we have? How can we not want our units to grow with families who will bring fresh devotion and energy? 

I remember the joy of sharing the gospel as a missionary. I want to feel that again! 

P.S. One of my favorite movies to watch on Halloween is "Coco", which is also one of the best movies to inspire us to pursue Family History.

 

Blessed by Living Waters

This post is part of the General Conference Odyssey. This week covers the Saturday morning session of the April 2003 conference.

Throughout the fall of 2022 I had the nagging feeling that I needed to establish a better habit of daily gospel study. I put it off until the new year when I determined that I would keep up with the Come Follow Me chapters and begin reading The Book of Mormon again, as well as keep up with the General Conference Odyssey and study the current conference talks. Ambitious, I know. But I felt I needed to up my game, as the saying goes. 

I enjoyed studying the life and ministry of the Savior in the first part of the New Testament. I found a YouTube channel that gives weekly insights to the Come Follow Me lessons which helped me grow a deeper love for Jesus Christ. Through the Book of Mormon I recalled that all families have challenges. Through General Conference talks I felt instructed and nourished.

When tragedy struck our family in April I clung to my testimony of Jesus Christ, so recently nourished and strengthened by my daily habit of gospel study. 

Sister Kathleen H. Hughes, First Counselor in the Relief Society General Presidency, said, "Living water heals. It nourishes and sustains. It brings peace and joy." That sentence alone struck me with great force. Because I had acted on a prompting, I could weather the storm of losing a precious son. I was partaking of the living water, and the bread of life daily.

Sister Hughes said, "There is cause to be concerned, but there is greater reason to be at peace."

Yes, yes, there is. We have a Savior, a Redeemer, a Friend and Brother, a Spiritual Father, all in the person of Jesus Christ, whose Atoning Sacrifice will make all things right in the end. Somehow. 

The Samaritan woman looked into the face of Christ, listened to His voice, and recognized Him at a time when most others rejected all He taught. We know Him too, or we can, if we allow His healing power, His nourishing strength, His peace and joy, to flow through us like "a well of water springing up into everlasting life."

I'm so grateful for daily manna to feed my soul.